Saligia
by Blackbirdox
Summary: Seven poets. Seven deadly sins.
1. Envy

**Disclaimer: I don't own Dead Poets Society. I wish Charlie owned me. **

**A/N: I've been working on this idea for months and I've finally gotten around to actually doing something about it. Now I just hope I can stick to it. In case anyone was wondering, the title is an old mnemonic based on the first letter of the Latin word for each of the sins. As always, enjoy and if you have a moment, review!**

Todd is jealous.

It's the worst part of his personality and he knows it. It trumps him being shy and closed off and unable to speak up for himself. It's something he can't control and a lot of the time, there's not even a specific trigger or cause. It's more of an omnipresent thing, constantly weighing heavily on the back of his mind.

He can't recall ever having met someone he didn't envy. He has the ability to pick out the best qualities in people and while he comes to admire them, he also resents them because he can't quite find them in himself. There's always something they have that he doesn't. Confidence and poise and intelligence and courage- everything he wants and everything he knows he'll never have.

He'd always wanted to be more like his brother who was seemingly perfect in everyone else's eyes. Todd wanted to be able to stand out like he did and please his parents like he did and have people admire him like he did. He had wanted to use Welton as a fresh start- a chance to finally break out and become the person he'd always hoped he could be. Instead, stepping through the gates equated to stepping farther into his brother's shadow. Todd couldn't go anywhere or do anything without being compared to Jeffery and he'd never felt more invisible in his entire life. Sometimes, it was as if he didn't even exist.

When they're all together, Todd looks around at the rest of the poets- his closest friends- and wonders exactly what it is that they see in him. He's nothing like the rest of them and he can't even begin to understand why they'd want him to be a part of their group.

He's not free-spirited like Charlie.

He's not brave like Knox.

He's not intelligent like Meeks.

He's not easygoing like Pitts.

He's not moral like Cameron.

And then there's Neil and he's certainly not anything like Neil.

Neil is the embodiment of everything Todd has ever wanted to be and Todd both loves and hates him for it. He's outgoing and vivacious and exceptionally bright and Todd has only found a handful of things about Neil that are less than perfect but he admires those things too.

He can't stand Neil's constant pushing and prodding and attempts to get him to break out of his shell because every time that happens, he's inadvertently reminded that he's never going to be anything like Neil despite both of their best attempts to make that happen and it just makes him absolutely _livid. _

But he never stops to think about those people he envies and the characteristics that they see in him that they know they lack in themselves.

Todd is sensitive and kind and he'll always listen, even though he doesn't always say much, and everyone who knows him appreciates the solid support he provides. He's steady and unwavering- considered by most to be an enviable quality.

Though Todd is too blinded by want to see them, he does possess the qualities he seeks.

And maybe one day, instead of searching through others, he'll be able to search through himself.


	2. Lust

Charlie doesn't believe in love.

Not the kind that would require more than a few moments of his time, anyway. He just believes in want and basic need and simple, uncomplicated encounters with nameless faces that provide intimacy without actually being intimate. There are no feelings and no connections- just pure lust and a desire to quell it.

He hasn't always been in this way. There was a time where he believed in falling in love and forming bonds and finding someone to care for who also cares for you.

That changed the summer he turned fifteen.

That was the year the Walker family had moved in next door. Their daughter Evelyn was two years older than Charlie and easily the most gorgeous girl he'd ever laid eyes on- all long legs and blonde hair and a perfect hourglass figure that was always clad in what his mother considered to be too tight dresses and too short skirts.

From the moment she'd moved in, the entire neighborhood talked about her- spreading rumors and gossiping about the alleged things she'd done and the supposed trouble she'd gotten into- but Charlie didn't care. He couldn't see what they saw because she was so different and so free spirited and taught him so many things that over the course of that summer, he'd fallen in love with her.

He had had relationships before and she certainly hadn't been the first person he'd ever developed feelings for but he'd fallen harder for her than he'd ever fallen for anyone.

She always made a point to spend time with him and even when she'd begun to make friends her own age; she invited him everywhere with them, never leaving him out of anything.

Evelyn brought him to parties and let him tag along on camping trips and midnight drives to nowhere. She turned him onto rock and roll and would just lay with him for hours listening to her records- Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis; the things that would cause his mother to have a stroke if she overheard them. Evelyn gave him all kinds of books like The Catcher In The Rye and On The Road- the two she'd deemed as being the greatest ever written. She'd gotten him drunk for the very first time and given him his first cigarette and his first joint.

The most important thing she'd given him was a feeling of truly being himself for the very first time. He didn't have to act with her and he never had to worry about pleasing her- he could be free. Just like she was. When they were together, he felt like he could do nothing wrong. No matter what he said or did, she'd be right there and she'd laugh at him and ruffle his hair and she'd always tell him that he was a great kid.

Until he wanted to prove he was more than just a kid, anyway.

When Charlie had returned home from Welton that winter for break, she'd invited him over and they'd just sat in front of the fire place and talked for hours until he couldn't handle talking anymore. Instead, he'd just leaned over and kissed her. He'd half expected her to throw him off and then throw him out but he was pleasantly surprised when she just simply kissed him back and began peeling off his clothes with effortless ease not more than a moment later.

The whole thing was awkward and messy and over much too quickly for Charlie's liking but she was his first and she was perfect and he'd never felt happier than when Evelyn clutched at him and sighed his name.

After they'd quietly redressed and she was shoving him out the door with the insistence that her parents would be home soon, he'd taken her hand and told her exactly how he felt about her, using those three little words for the first time in his life.

And all she'd done was laugh. "Charlie," she told him, reaching out to ruffle his hair. "It was just sex."

He'd left as quickly as he could, her words echoing through his mind with the force of a rampant freight train.

_It was just sex._

Charlie had finally realized then that she was exactly what everyone said she was. She was loose and she was trouble and she did whatever she wanted to and she'd broken his heart because he hadn't been smart enough to realize that.

He avoided her the best he could until he went back to school and he never did speak to her again after that but try as he might, he never forgot her or what she'd showed him.

Feelings complicated everything and they let you get hurt and there was no need for that when there were people out there who would give you exactly what you needed for nothing at all. Everything was just about fun and mutual enjoyment and there wasn't much about that that could wind up hurting you.

Charlie can now understand the way Evelyn looked at the world and the things that she'd done because she'd trained him to be the same way. It's just fun- all about fun and getting what you want and not needing someone else to make you happy.

He had always been certain that you needed to be in love but now he really doesn't care. He's perfected the charm he's always had and now there's no girl- or guy, for that matter, because there's really no reason to have a preference- he can't get into bed and he wouldn't have it any other way.

He's lost count of how many people he's been with and he tries to ignore thinking about how many of them he's hurt and the look he always seems to get when he crawls out of bed because he knows exactly how they feel. He's hurting people just like he was hurt but there's a certain feeling of being invincible that comes along with people just falling at your feet and Charlie _loves _it. He doesn't need to love someone else because everyone loves him and that's more than enough.

_It's just sex._

That's what he'll always tell them, usually throwing a wink in their direction. That's how it is for him and that's how it's always going to be- not only to protect his reputation but his heart as well.


End file.
